


A Lady of Breeding

by vanessa_cardui



Category: Original Work
Genre: Bestiality, Class Issues, Dehumanization, F/F, F/M, Forced Orgasm, Forced Pregnancy, Human Experimentation, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Other, misuse of magic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-16
Updated: 2017-07-16
Packaged: 2018-12-02 23:12:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11519490
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vanessa_cardui/pseuds/vanessa_cardui
Summary: The revolution has come, and the Lady Beryllan Maymercy was among the first against the wall--but not in the "getting shot" sense.  Instead, she's been handed over to a plebeian scholar with a keen interest in breeding magical warbeasts, and an equally keen interest in making Beryllan suffer as much as possible during the process.





	A Lady of Breeding

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dresca](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dresca/gifts).



"Hold her," said the fat little man, and two of the rebels grabbed Beryllan, one on either side. They were in her garden; behind her, in the manor, there were whoops and crashes that Beryllan gritted her teeth and tried not to hear.

The papers had been blathering about revolutionary incitement for months, but that was just the sort of thing that they liked to talk about to make people afraid. It hadn't been real. The Maymercies had been lords of the Traiourai for six hundred and fourteen years, and they always would be.

Perhaps not always. The rebels would be put down, of course; Beryllan's cousins were in the military, and she had seen them marching in their uniforms, with sorcery dancing at their fingertips. There wasn't any way peasants could stand against them, no matter how many of them there were. But the Lady Beryllan Maymercy was the last heir of the Maymercy, and it didn't seem that the military was likely to rescue her just yet.

The man dipped a gray-crystal stamp in a paid of blue ink. A low-born using gray-crystal? Well, they'd cast off all other restraints. Why not the one governing who could and who could not use the tools of the wizards. They would regret that, though. Whatever happened to Beryllan, magic left its scent on those who used it. After this was over, they'd track down the fat little man, and they'd baste him in his own fat.

He reached up with the stamp, and grunted. He hadn't gotten higher than Beryllan's chest. "Push her head down," he said. "Needs to get to her forehead."

Beryllan fought back a laugh. They couldn't even reach what they sought to tear down. Then one of the rebels holding her grabbed her hair and pulled her head down to the level of the fat little man with the gray-crystal stamp.

"There were two hundred and seventeen deaths of commoners on Maymercy lands and Maymercy owned factories in the last five years," said the man, reading from a pamphlet in his other hand. "It is the judgment of this court that at least twenty-one of these deaths were caused by malnutrition in a place of plenty, by failure to allow work to be conducted safely, and because the lives of those who worked for the Maymercy were considered of less importance than the fortunes of the Maymercy."

That was all said in a single gasp, more or less. The man sucked in a breath and then continued quickly.

"The Lady Beryllan Maymercy was sole sovereign of those lands during the time considered. It was in her hands to raise the wages above those that led to starvation, to make the factories safe instead of deadly, and to deal justly with those who were injured in her employ. She did not. It is thus the judgment of this court that the Lady Beryllan Maymercy has forfeited the rights common to humanity, and she is given into the custody of the state, to be used for the benefit of the humanity of which she is no longer a part."

Given how little time the rebels would have before their insurrection was put down, it made sense that they had to talk fast. The man dipped his stamp in the ink a second time--there wasn't any need for that, gray-crystal could hold ink for days. "Hold her tight," he said. "I don't want it smudging."

The one who'd pulled her head down knotted his fingers in her hair; the other one held onto her arm with hands like clamps. The fat little man brought the stamp to Beryllan's forehead. She jerked back, as the pain lanced through her, like a burn, worse than a burn, worse than anything.

"Court adjourned," he said. "Get her in the car. Oh, and give me her shoes. State property isn't supposed to wear shoes."

"And your wife is, Terric," said the man with his hand in Beryllan's hair.

"She is," said the man. "She's a good woman, and deserves whatever perks I can get her. Now, get on with it. There are three more people who need to be tried in the district. And then we're going to have to get on to Farrowdawn before the patriots there decide the law is too slow and make their own judgment."

"Sure," said the man, and he pushed Beryllan to the ground with a sudden shove. Beryllan just lay there, not even resisting as the other man yanked her shoes off, too shocked by what had just happened. State property? Farrowdawn? These men were shopkeepers and farriers, they'd dare--

She tried to shout at them, tried to speak. Nothing at all. There had been a silence rune on that stamp. So she came up off the ground, grabbing at the man's hand. He just shrugged it off, and the other two lifted up into the cart the rebels had driven up into her estate and tossed her in the back. There was a click, as one of the guards snapped something onto her ankle, and then the cart jerked into motion, knocking Beryllan over.

The chain on her ankle was a short one, linked to a loop on the floor of the cart. Beryllan pulled herself up to sit and looked around. There were two others in the cart with her; Duke Braicry, whose jacket was torn and whose face looked as puffy as a boxer's who'd stood for a dozen rounds, and the new Lady Caier, a slip of a girl with piled masses of curly red hair. They both had stamps on their foreheads. PROPERTY OF THE DEVELOPMENT UNIT, a pain rune, and a silence rune.

She reached up to her own forehead, which still felt tender, tried to feel the runes there. It was going to cost a fortune to get a cosmetic caster to reverse that, if he even could; the rebels had used three times as much ink as was needed. More.

Braicry had his head in his hands and didn't really seem to be even aware of anyone else; Caier turned away from Beryllan, staring at the wall of the cart. That seemed like a reasonable idea; if it wasn't for the silence rune, Beryllan would have been compelled to say something, and she had no idea about what one would say under those circumstances.

The cart bumped and rattled, driven by someone who didn't know how to manage it. There was a brief pause, and then Lord Arrath and his wife both were dumped in, the same stamp as they all wore just below Lord Arrath's snowy hair, and the golden hair of his young wife. It was worse than madness, but there was nothing they could do. The rebels had activated the silence rune, but not the pain rune, not yet. They couldn't even fight back, not against someone who could key the rune.

The all sat on the floor of the cart, none of them wearing shoes, all with their ankles chained to the floor, as the cart bumped along country lanes and then onto the cobblestones of the city.

The rebels had taken Bresca? But how? There had been a whole division of troops stationed on the old city walls; Beryllan had been there for their parade, at the start of the opera season. There were the Toromaunts, who were cousins of the Maymercies, and there had been at least a half-dozen Toromaunt heirs in that troop; she'd seen their uniforms and their swords. There wasn't any way that a pack of shopkeepers could've even stood in front of them when they drew their blades.

But when the cart pulled to a stop, they pulled them out into the yard of Bresca tower, where a few months back Beryllan had watched the troops display from the reviewing stands before their march through the streets. Now green and blue bunting hung from the old fortress walls, and instead of proper uniforms, the soldiers on the walls wore ugly drab. But the guns they carried looked deadly, short barreled things with flaring stocks, and with bandoliers of charges strung across the soldier's chests.

It was soldiers who pulled Beryllan and the others out of the cart, out to where two men and a woman wearing scholars' robes were waiting. "That's all?" asked the woman.

The soldier shrugged. "There's going to be another load from Farrowdawn this evening," he said. "Patriots got to the Prince Seir before the court, so unless you're looking for pieces, there's nobody from that household whose going to be of much use."

But Prince Seir was the Privy Seal. They couldn't possibly have. . .

The woman sighed. "Truth is, we're lucky to have gotten the crop we have. Nobody wants to risk these things getting loose."

"And parts can be of use," said one of the men. "Once the courts convict, get whatever is left of Prince Seir onto ice, and send the bits over, along with anything that can be salvaged from the rest of his household. The prince was the only one with a property verdict, but the rest would be prisoners, and state prisoners have automatic donor status."

The soldier saluted. Then the woman looked at the nobility assembled before her, who were shifting their weight here and there, trying to find somewhere to stand on the dirt and rocks and sparse grass of the parade grounds.

"As you are no doubt aware," said the woman. "There has been a change of administration. And as you may not be aware, at the very first sign of civil protest, our majesty by grace of god invited in an invasion from the Empire of Rainshorn."

None of them were going to give the woman the satisfaction of a reaction, and frankly, Beryllan wasn't sure why that woman expected them to care. Beryllan was a Maymercy of Traiourai, not a politician; she had her station her responsibilities, which she would take up as soon as this farce was ended. What the crown decided to promise the hayseeds of Rainshorn wasn't of the slightest interest to her.

"Now, as you are property of our unit, it doesn't really matter what you do or think. If you obey promptly, you will have food and water; if you do not, you will have pain. Undress, now."

Beryllan gaped at her. Lord Arrath didn't take it as mildly. He stepped forward, his hand going back over his shoulder to slap down this commoner in a scholar's costume, who dared to even suggest something like that to a lord of the realm. And then he collapsed, face contorted in agony.

There was a sudden twisting pain in Beryllan's stomach. She grabbed at it, doubling over, feeling like she'd just been stabbed. First in her stomach, and then through the palms of her hands. When the pain eased, only the Duke Braicry was still standing. His jacket was on the parade ground beside him, and he was working at the buttons of his shirt.

The Lady Caier looked up at him with utter contempt. And then her back arched in pain, and then Beryllan started shivering. It felt like she had been tossed out into a snow-bank, sudden cold everywhere.

The Lady Caier was the last to start undressing, and she did it slowly, with shaking fingers. It didn't matter much. One of the men in a scholar's robe checked his watch, as they took off the clothing that had been left to them after their. . . well, trial wasn't the word, clearly, and neither was arrest. Since their capture, call it. But that look at his watch was only mild impatience, and that was the closest they'd gotten to a reaction from any of the rebels to anything they'd done.

"You've been drafted," said the woman, "to fight for the cause of freedom against Imperial tyranny. It is an honor you do not deserve, but it is also one that you will not enjoy."

"Why are you even talking to them?" asked one of the men.

She shrugged. "Why not. Anyhow. Which of them are you taking?"

"Redheads have higher resistance to mental control spells," said the shorter of the two men. "So that'd spoil my baseline measurements. Tell you what--if you don't make a fuss about my getting the pick of the next batch, I'll take the old one, and leave it at that."

"Done," said the woman. "Brash?"

"Blonde and the other male," he said. "I mean, it's not like your project needs males anyway."

"And you're going to spoil your methodology by abusing the blonde."

He shrugged. "We're duplicating field conditions. Soldiers come in traumatized for treatment."

She sighed. "She's starting with wider hips than the other two. I--"

"You pulled half the last group," said Brash. "Deal?"

"Deal," she said with another sigh. "So long as they both test fertile. Otherwise--"

"Otherwise, I'll have to traumatize someone who isn't blonde. Fine."

Soldiers came forward, and took away everyone except for Beryllan and the Lady Caier. Then they laid iron chains around Beryllan's neck and the Lady Caier's, took them to a pair of cages at the edge of the parade ground, and locked them there.

Lady Caier's hands had been trembling so badly that they'd given her an additional shot with the pain rune even after she'd started to comply. It kept trembling as they led her to the cage. She sat and wept, never looking at Beryllan, not seeing the guards who patrolled the walls of the castle they had stolen.

The whole night, at every unexpected noise, at every click of a rifle or bark of a dog, Beryllan was sure it was the army, finally coming in from the capital to crush the rebels, and liberate their prisoners.

She didn't sleep much, naked in that cage, and in the morning, the army hadn't come to liberate the prisoners. Instead, there were soldiers, who washed her and Caier off, and who fed them and made them drink, and then chained them up, bent in half over a pair of old show-jumping hurdles.

Whenever they tried to resist, or even when they were too slow to obey the commands they were given, the soldiers activated the pain runes. It hurt every time, and it was different every time; fire behind her fingernails, or the chill of the grave, or crushing or choking. It was easier to do what they wanted. Lady Caier started off resisting everything, but even she submitted docilely in the end, letting them chain her legs to opposite sides of the hurdle and her wrists to the rings that had held the mountings for the parade ground flags.

As part of the whole morning procedure, they'd been made to piss into cups, one small indignity in the midst of something utterly lacking in dignity from beginning to end. And it seemed that the cups had revealed something to the woman scholar they'd seen earlier. "Good news," she said, patting the Lady Caier on her flank. "You're both entirely fertile. And as we've managed to capture a Rainshorn warbeast, you are going to be bolstering our reserves of heavy troops. Unfortunately, neither of you currently have the capacity to serve in that capacity, some adjustments are going to have to be made."

Beryllan had met women like that scholar during her years at university. They thought the world owed them something because they were smart. It didn't, but they'd tried to talk it into paying up, at first enthusiastic, then bitter, but always talking. They were even more tiresome than the sort of climbers who hoped to marry up, or who wanted to be able to tell their shopkeeper husbands, "Oh, the Lady Maymercy--we were chums in varsity," or whatever it was that people of that class said.

She had thought herself well quit of them then, and she would be delighted when the army finally came through and freed her of this one again. She would request that the magistrate give her a silence rune and a pain rune, and keep them both active until she died, writhing in quiet agony.

Her hand went up Beryllan's side, to rest at her hip. "Muscle strain from this position?" she said, and tsked. "There is going to have to be an exercise regimen added, if there's going to be any hope of carrying the hybrid to term. And we'll have to have the barber in before the evening class gets here, because there absolutely cannot be fur on the regions where we're going to be working."

Even if she could talk, Beryllan wouldn't have dignified that with a response. The talkers wanted you to talk back, and they hated it when you didn't. Only with the silence spell on, there wasn't any way for her to make it clear that her silence was lordly disdain rather than terrified submission.

Not that it mattered much; the woman gave Beryllan's backside a satisfied little smack, and then headed over to the guards to yammer at them. Also, while Beryllan was filled with lordly disdain, she also had a certain amount of terror there.

If the army didn't come soon, and they cut off her hair and cut runes into her scalp. . . well, it would be talked about. Obviously, there wasn't anything she could've done differently, and when they talked about her, it would be, "Why, think of what they did to the Lady Maymercy, poor girl," rather than attacks on her morals and character. But she would become the Lady Maymercy Poor Girl, and would have to suffer the charity of those who would prefer to see the Lady Maymercy Poor Girl diminished, so as to make themselves feel greater.

It was something to worry about, as her legs started to twitch and tremble, and the ache in her back spread up her spine and out to her shoulders.

Then the barber came out, and the first sign that the rebels would not be shaving her head was a bucket of cold water poured over her hips and ass. She yelped, or would've--the silence rune still kept her from making any noise--and then she would've definitely yelped again, as he started spreading the lather over her pussy.

The Lady Caier had been treated first. Beryllan had looked away, out of basic politeness, and because she had not wanted to see Caier suffer the way that she was about to. But she sneaked a glance over to the hurdle next to her, and Caier was trembling as badly as Beryllan under the strain of her position. There were still those masses of red hair on her head, but her face was set and pale with bite marks on her lower lip.

The barber hummed tunelessly as he worked the lather between Beryllan's legs. Then there was one meaty hand on the inside of Beryllan's thigh, and the cold touch of the razor at the side of her outer lips. "Weren't for they guards," he said, with a thick backcountry accent, "There'd be something else going between there. But since it's no, hold still, filly. Lest I cut me a chunk of meat for my meal, yeh?"

She wasn't fidgeting because she wanted to; her legs were moving because she had been kept in a difficult position for a long time, and couldn't stand still. But she did her best to keep completely still as the razor slid across her pussy, and then again as he washed her off, lathered her up again, and shaved again.

It was difficult to fight back tears. Yes, the army was going to come, and yes, every single person who dared to even consider joining the sort of infamous treatment she'd been getting was going to be killed for it, but there was a bumpkin with a razor to her most sensitive places, and there were guards who stopped by to leer, and when the barber was done, Beryllan was more naked than she had ever been. The reality of what was happening was starting to sink in.

When the barber was finished, the guards changed her position, so that she was standing up, her arms held up over her head, tied to some overhang from the wall, and her legs spread apart. At least they were facing the wall, rather than the yard--she wasn't going to have to see the faces of the men leering at her, or the women enjoying their moment of superiority to their superiors.

It was a more human position, anyway, rather than trying to spend hours bent double at the waist, and while Beryllan couldn't relax, exactly, she was at least able to breathe.

Until the woman scholar came back. This time, she didn't come back alone. By the sounds of it, there were at least a dozen others with her, and Beryllan could hear the relish in the woman's voice.

"So," she said. "Let's see what we're working with. I don't want to have to get trauma in to deal with our mistakes, so make sure you get your casting right. The limit of the flesh without tearing. Now, to avoid confusion, let us identify the subjects. She patted Beryllan on her ass. "The Lady Beryllan Maymercy," she said. Then she brought something down, and Beryllan let out a silent howl, at the pain from the left side of her ass. It burned, it burned, it burned.

"Not quite as elegant as graycrystal, but it gets the job done," said the woman. "There. Subject 504." Then she left Beryllan sagging in her chains, and went over to the Lady Caier. "The Lady Seffa Caeir." A faint sound, like beef on a grill. "Subject 505. Streric, you have 504, Mars, 505. I want something that will model their internal dimensions, please."

If it wasn't for the silence spell, Beryllan would have still been weeping from the pain of whatever it was. A brand? No, something worse than a brand--she'd seen animals branded, and runaway serfs. When it was done properly, it didn't hurt that much, and it didn't keep hurting that much. This was much worse than that.

But then there was something creeping up her leg. She tried to shake it off, but there wasn't that much play in her chains. From the clanks, it seemed that Lady Caier was trying to do the same thing, but she doubted it would do any good. It went up, and further up, until it was against her pussy, cold and wet, and it pushed in.

Beryllan was twisting against it, but it didn't matter. It was cold, and it was wet, and it was pressing up inside her, and growing, and growing, and she would scream if she could, but they weren't even letting her do that, and it hurt so much; every crease inside of her, every fold, it was all being stretched as far as it could.

The growing slowed, concentrated in a few places, where there were a few little remaining spurts of growth. Then it stopped.

"Good," said the woman. "The living water without matches the living water within. This is the capacity of our subjects. As you can see, 504 has slightly more generous dimensions than 505, but they are reasonably similar, both in terms of the crimes they committed, and in terms of the internal dimensions of their reproductive systems."

There was a thud of something dropping to the dirt of the parade ground. "This is a model of the engorged membrum virile of the warbeast that will be introduced to the subjects. So. How are we going to fit an object of these dimensions into receptacles of those dimensions?"

"They'll get a bit wider inside when aroused," said a male voice.

"Indeed," said the woman. "Here, you can see that the Lady Beryllan has started to warm to her new friend."

Beryllan was naked; there was no hiding anything. But she flushed at that. It was just that it was continuing to push into her. That was it.

"Now, it is true that in the course of things, a human child can fit through the relevant aperture. But this requires a good deal of time and strain, and will often result in tears and damage, which we intend to avoid, so as to allow the fetus to be carried to term. So. While it is true that arousal will heighten the results of other efforts, it is not a complete solution. What else?"

"Space distortion spells?" suggested a woman.

"If we turned the aperture in question into a distortion portal, it might well allow the membrum to fit, yes. But would conception take place, if the sperm are traveling through folded space?"

There was a pause.

"It's going to have to be internal modifications," said one of the men.

"But if we do that too quickly, we'll get organ failure," said another.

They argued about it for a time. During that argument, the thing that had filled her suddenly turned to water and splashed to the ground beneath her in a great flood. Nobody was paying attention to that. Instead, they agreed that they were going to do some space folding spells--an everfull purse, apparently, and they were also going to do anatomical adjustment.

"So," said the woman. "Divide yourselves into groups, and let's get started. We have given the military an estimate of twelve to eighteen months before we will be able to put hybrid warbeasts into the field, and I would very much like to do better than that estimate."

Beryllan and the Lady Caier stood there, trying to find some way to stand which wasn't too uncomfortable, as the scholars decided who would be working on what, and exactly what they were going to do. And then they were ready to start.

"The problem," said one of the men from the group, "is that activating their runes would interfere with the runes we want to put on them."

"Well," said the woman. "Then I fear that we are going to have to use more primitive methods to keep our subjects within protocols. When you're ready to begin, let the runes slip. And then let us begin."

Beryllan hadn't realized to what extent she'd been relying on that silence spell. When it finally lapsed, she was suddenly sobbing. The Lady Caier, though, started on the parentage and accomplishments of the woman scholar who didn't seem able to shut up under any circumstances.

"505," said the woman. "It is true that we are not going to be suppressing your ability to speak through the use of runes. However, if you persist in your attempts to disrupt our work, I am going to call a military surgeon in from the barracks, and they are going to sever your vocal cords."

"No you won't," said the Lady Caier. "You are talking to us because you want us to say that you're right. And you are not right, and you know that as well. I will not be silent, and I will not be cowed by your threats. This is--"

"Trayin? Will you run this message to the surgeons? And if you'll pass me the discarded draft of the abdominal runes for a temporary solution, thank you."

"If you expect me to grovel, or to comply with your absurd demands, I will not--"

The woman slapped her across the face. A big, backhanded blow that left blood trickling down the Lady Caier's mouth, and a look of triumph in her eyes. Then she punched her in the stomach, and when she gasped for breath, she stuffed a wad of paper into her mouth, holding it place with an open hand.

"As 504 is both more tractable and more enthusiastic about her service to the nation," she said. "Let us begin there, until the surgeons have completed their work."

It was a dare, more or less. The woman wanted Beryllan to say something so that she could justify having her vocal cords cut as well. Beryllan had read her better than the Lady Caier had--she was someone who had been upset that she had not been heard while things were as they were supposed to be, so now she wanted to be heard, and she did not want to have to listen to anyone else.

Beryllan had brought her sobbing under control--it had just bubbled out because the silence rune had been lifted, and she maintained an attitude of haughty silence. Right up until they tightened her chains so that she couldn't move, and then started cutting into her stomach.

Then she howled. If they were going to cut her vocal cords for that, then they were going to cut her vocal cords. She couldn't help it. It hurt so very much.

"Ma'am," said one of the students. "If you'd quiet this one down as well, it'd--"

"If you are going to work with subsentients," she said, "you are going to have to get used to hearing objections of that sort. It is the deliberate attempts to confuse our lines of thought and to sap our resolve which can't be tolerated. But all the same, be careful--if you overload on the sexual stimulation, you're going to exhaust her, and she's going to need to be active until the pregnancy is well underway, if we're going to have any chance of bringing the hybrid to full term."

"Can we pin her down?" asked one of the woman. "The way she's jerking, she's going to spoil a line or two somewhere."

"Hm," said the woman. "Hold on a second--an incapacitating spell for 505 please. Leave her conscious, of course."

One of the students cast, and all of the Lady Caer's joints stiffened. Only her eyes moved, frightened, as a pair of military surgeons got to work on her throat with tiny knives that glinted sharp in the afternoon sun.

They added more chains to Beryllan. Chains and lengths of steel poles which pinned her into place, so that she couldn't escape the knives and those burning runes that the students were working on her abdomen and her mons. And it seemed that while people working with subsentients were going to have to get used to noises, hers were too loud--someone found a dirty rag, stuffed it into her mouth, and tied into place with a length of cord. She wasn't as quiet as she'd been with the silence rune, but her shouts and screams and pleas were muffled into unintelligiblity.

Lady Caier had it worse, of course--when the surgeons left, and the incapacitating spell was dropped, she could only make strange hooting noises, like someone blowing over the top of a jar. They got louder, when the students got to work on her stomach.

And what they were doing was working. At least Beryllan hoped that it was working. She could feel desire building in her, the pressure, the pulse, the way her toes were flexing in the dirt of the yard. It was an unfocused desire--there wasn't anyone or anything making her feel those things, but even the cuts of the knife and the burns of the magic were strangely sensual, as well as painful.

It was artificial. She knew that. But that didn't change anything. Whereas before she'd been fighting back tears and trying not to beg for them not to do anything to her, now she was fighting back moans as well. Not entirely successfully, when the woman ran her hand up her firmly chained side to caress her breast.

"Good," said the woman. "Very responsive. Now, I don't believe it would be a good idea to keep her at the peak of arousal at all times. The body tends to adjust to its baseline, so the spells would have to be adjusted anyway. And while, in a purely physical sense, the nobility tend to have good hearts, keeping her at that degree of arousal would put a strain on the system that might well lead to losing the subject completely before the work is done. I believe that a climax is similarly counter-indicated. It's an excess strain on the system, and a relaxant that we do not need or desire."

There were arguments as Beryllan panted, her body on fire, the woman's hand sending sparks of pleasure wherever it touched her, as she idly caressed her. She didn't really follow the argument, and when something started crawling up her leg, she let out a helpless little mewl of pleasure, despite what they were doing, despite the crude stitches on the Lady Caier's neck, despite the fact that it had taken so impossibly long for the army to come save them.

It slipped inside her easily, and started to swell. The pleasure wasn't quite as intense as it had been, but it felt good inside her, really good, even though it ached a little as it pressed her. "There," said the woman. "Now, seal it inside, and get to work on reorganizing the liver and kidneys, so that the everfull purse will have somewhere to expand into on penetration, and the subject will not rupture during coitus."

The pleasure had eased enough that Beryllan was screaming in pain as they started cutting into the skin on her back, rather than with sexual release. It didn't matter, either way--the runes were drawn, and the spell patterns set, and Beryllan could feel her insides twisting around in response to the magic. It hurt, and it was not just worse than the worst thing that had ever happened to her. It was worse than the worst things that she had ever imagined happening to her.

A different group had started on the Lady Caier, whose distorted and agonized hoots and strange, empty-jug whistles reminded her that while this was worse than anything she had dreamed possible, there were people with darker dreams. And that those people were in charge of her, at least until rescue came, and if she wanted to survive intact, she had to endure.

Rescue did not come that night. The broad strokes with knife and burning stone became finer and finer cuts, with scalpel and pinprick bits of burning stone, etching the patterns into her back and belly and thighs and labia--they used a device to pull those out, hold them flat, to allow the students to work as Beryllan wept. Then the students went in for their evening meal, and the guards brought out food for Beryllan and the Lady Caier. An oatmeal mush, with a greasy layer of fat on its surface, and water that tasted strongly of tin.

It was revolting, but Beryllan was starving. The Lady Caier refused to touch any of it, and the woman in charge shrugged, gave her orders to the guards, who returned some time later with a device similar to the one used to fatten geese. "Liberated from the prison," she said, pulling Lady Caier's hair back and tying it into a braid, as the guards forced her mouth open and pushed the nozzle of the device down her throat. "It was used to make sure that those who were required to pay for their food and lodging did not attempt to escape those requirements by refusing to eat what was put before them."

Lady Caier made her strangled noises as they strapped the nozzle into place and began turning the crank that forced the oatmeal paste into her stomach. "Did you know?" said the woman. "The entire prisoner debt of the nation was equal to less than half of the value of the Caier family estates? Imagine that--with a single act of charity, you could have freed almost two hundred thousand people from prison back to their families, and still been wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice."

Her hand drifted lower, squeezed Lady Caier's breast. "Well, don't worry. You have other opportunities for public service. And well done eating what was set before you, 504. You're adjusting marvelously. If all goes well, I'm afraid this lies in store for you as well--there's no way you'd be able to eat all the calories required to bring a hybrid to term. But, well. No sense in borrowing tomorrow's sorrows for today, eh? Sleep well, ladies, and I shall see you again tomorrow morning. There's only one additional day before we introduce the more important specimen, so there is a great deal for us all to do."

She left, and the guards put Beryllan and the Lady Caier into their cages at the side of the training ground. The thing in her pussy stayed there, pulsing, straining inside her, forcing her more and more open and expanding to fill the space. It ached, and it sent waves of pleasure through her that she hated almost as much as the pain of the whip. That night, Beryllan was more tired, and less certain that rescue was coming, and in the morning, she started to feel that it was not likely that rescue was going to come at all--while the guards were cleaning and tending to Beryllan and the Lady Caier, another cart full of captives arrived, and even though they were at the other side of the prison yard, there was a face there which she could recognize from a lot further off. Smooth, high forehead, perfect military posture, and an ease even when surrounded by jabbering proles. His Majesty, by Grace of God, Luthias III. Beryllan wasn't close enough to hear the people in scholar's robes arguing about whose project his majesty was going to be used for, but it didn't take long for them to reach a verdict. The king refused to undress, of course, so the guards knocked him down, cut his clothing off him, and sent him to one of the carts.

And then it was their turn.

The woman looked unhappy as she came back, and Beryllan flinched at the set of her jaw. Given how much pain she'd had to endure the day before, given how the whole world seemed to be collapsing on its foundations, she wasn't ready to suffer more because of some blabber-mouth's bad mood.

"It is true that it is an experimental procedure. But the theory is sound, and it would've been a strong statement, in favor of . . ." she shook her had, and sighed. "And now it is time for me to step aside for the day; there's going to be extensive call for my skills tomorrow, in order for the hybridization to take place without resurrection being required, but for now, all that is required is a certain amount of livestock management. Radell?"

Radell was a paunchy man, a few inches shorter than Beryllan, with thin hair. He looked at both Beryllan and the Lady Caier, and gave a quick nod. "Simplest thing is to do, and then correct mistakes. It's going to hurt a little. Pay attention, and it won't hurt too much."

Lady Caier wheezed at him, which he ignored. There was a certain freedom in that--she didn't have to hold back her comments anymore. They weren't heard, but that was the fault of what they'd done to her, not a choice she'd made. Not her cowardice.

Beryllan didn't say anything, and she didn't struggle against the guards when they strapped her hands to short crutches. They weren't like regular crutches--they only added a little more than a foot to the length of their arms, and it seemed that was the point. The soldiers made them lean forward, and then the crutches were adjusted, and adjusted again, until they were the right length for Beryllan and the Lady Caier to walk on all fours, keeping their backs straight.

Because the pain spells weren't working, Radell used a small whip to adjust their posture, or to beat them if they refused to obey. The Lady Caier stood it for longer than Beryllan could, and the truth was, Beryllan could've stood it longer than she did, but she just didn't see the point. The king had spoken with quiet authority, and he had not done what they had told him to do. They had beaten him down, and stripped him, and he was going to be subjected to whatever horrible experiment they had planned. What was nobler about doing what one was told after being forced to scream in agony than in doing it when told?

The Lady Caier had stood upright with her hands strapped into those things, refused to bow. So Radell had hit her with a dog-whip, patiently, over and over, on her ass and her breasts and her stomach and her thighs, until, sobbing, she had complied. Beryllan had done what he had told her to do. It was stupid and humiliating, and even if she was restored to her place and to her home that very evening, she would always remember having done that. Was it better to have done it only when forced? When she obeyed, there were pulses of pleasure from the thing that they'd put inside of her, which made her want to fight back, but she let that provocation go as well; having heard the scholar woman talk, she wouldn't have been surprised if that sort of reward was designed to make her rebel so that she could be punished.

Once he had convinced them both to walk with those arm extensions, Radell had them eat and drink from troughs while still strapped in like that. "It's a skill you'll need," he said, scratching Beryllan behind her ear as she drank. "Pregnancy is going to move fast, and be big. Can't manage that as a biped."

She looked up at him.

"Like Edrah's probably told you, most of your feeding is going to be mechanical. But the more you can manage to get down, the less they'll have to do that, eh? And if you can keep moving while you're carrying it to term, the delivery will go a little easier."

Edrah? That was probably the woman in the scholar's robes, the one who would not stop talking. It was strange, given how much she'd known about them, that Beryllan hadn't learned her name until then. And it was strange that Beryllan was focusing on that, rather than what Radall had told her about what was going to happen to her. It was . . . Beryllan looked off, into the distance. It was going to happen. It was going to happen the next day. There wasn't going to be any rescue, and the peasants weren't going to realize that they'd made a terrible mistake and hand over their ringleaders for execution. Maybe it would be easier to face that the way the Lady Caier had chosen--by denying it, and by fighting the whip until she couldn't fight any longer.

But easy or hard, it was going to happen.

The guards didn't unstrap the extensions from their arms that night. They slept, as best as they could sleep, with poles strapped to their wrists and magical symbols engraved on their bodies. Arbella dreamed of Edrah jabbering at her, of King Luthias falling to the ground, bloodied by the fists of the guards, of Luthias rising up for her, grown strange and twisted and monstrous, and of trying to gallop away from him on legs which ended in hoofs. And all the while, even in the dream, she knew that what was actually coming would be worse.

The next morning, the guards washed and fed them as before. Once again, the Lady Caier refused to eat what she was given, and once again, they brought the device out and forced the food into her stomach. And then Edrah was back, with her cloud of attending students.

"There are two dozen more property verdicts to be handed down this week," she said. "And there are others being considered. All with blood as pure and standing as high as 504 and 505. But while we have a surplus of otherwise useless nobility, Rainshorn warbeasts are a good deal harder to obtain. If things go poorly, the condition of the warbeast is of primary importance. Use mild soporific spells, and do not chain them--I don't want to have to explain why I lost that subject, whether or not insemination was completed. There is a great deal that could go wrong with carrying a hybrid pregnancy to term, and while you have done fine work with our current subjects, you are undoubtedly going to have to repeat something similar with 506, 507, and however many others are given to us to work with."

"Are they going to be restrained?" asked one of her students, a girl with an intense look and her hair pulled back into a tight braid. A striver who had not yet learned how little effort meant, in the scheme of things.

Edrah shook her head. "That was attempted, and was not productive. Anything with enough play to allow adjustments when covered by a warbeast allows too much play to be effective. The doors of the parade grounds will be locked, and their hands will remain incapacitated, when the warbeast is introduced." She took out her watch, and tsked. "Which will have to be done soon. There are other projects involving that subject, and I do not wish to delay them. After our subjects have been covered, I will direct the casting of the soporifics. Now, let us clear the yard, and begin work on the aphrodisiac spells that will allow our subjects to get on with their work."

Beryllan looked over to Lady Caier, who was looking straight ahead, not at Edrah, not at her. The guards had hit her until she took up the four-legged stance they wanted, but that was the only concession that she'd made to doing as she was told.

First the students cleared the parade grounds, and then the guards left as well. As soon as the guards were gone, the Lady Caier stood, shook back her mass of red hair, and gave Beryllan a scornful look. Then she strode off toward one of the doors, which the soldiers had left through. Beryllan stood as well, but she didn't go anywhere. There wasn't anywhere to go. Even if the soldiers had left the doors unlocked, and even if she managed to get clear of Bresca tower with those half-crutches tied to her hands, where would she go? Maymercy had fallen to rebels, and the king was in their hands. As a girl, Beryllan had thrilled to tales of noblemen in hiding, who had turned the tables on their oppressors, but she knew that she had none of the relevant skills those nobles had conveniently acquired.

Besides, the doors had not been left unlocked. The Lady Caier pounded on it with the things they'd strapped to her arms, making that empty-bottle noise that she did. It didn't seem likely to Beryllan that they would let it open for her.

One of the other doors was opening, though. The big gates, where the cavalry troops used to parade out of Bresca tower before their march through the town. Then she did move, backing away. Two, three steps, as it opened. The Lady Caier heard the gates creaking open as well, and turned away from hammering at the door she had chosen, to watch the warbeast that had been captured from the armies of Rainshorn enter the parade grounds of Bresca tower.

Warbeasts weren't included in military parades. Something about them being too dangerous, or not suitable for ordered drill--Beryllan wasn't one to care about that sort of thing. But as it entered the grounds, she could see why they didn't want that thing in the streets. It was rust orange, and it looked to be twenty, maybe twenty-two hands at the shoulder, and its chest was broader than any horse that Beryllan had ever seen. She gasped, and it swiveled its head toward her, great green eyes looking directly at her.

Beryllan froze. The head was something like a dog's, with a long, broad muzzle. Ears cupped like a bats', a lashing tail, and claws like scimitars on every leg. She froze, but it had seen her. It took a step toward her, bigger than the biggest horse that she had ever seen, but it didn't move like a horse. More like some great cat, though its claws didn't retract. Beryllan had always liked cats; they were elegant and soft, and she had been amused by their lordly disdain for everything else.

But she'd seen them playing with mice and small birds, and other prey of that sort, and she could see something of how a cat viewed a squirrel in the set of its haunches, in the intent look in its eyes, wide as saucers. It was looking at her, and she knew that she shouldn't run, that if she did, it would be on her, but it was so big, and there was the smell of it, a thick, animal reek, and even though the mice knew that they ought to remain still, there would come a time when they couldn't remain still, and they ran, and suffered for it. She stood, heart hammering in her chest, trying not to run, trying not to twitch, trying to remember to breathe. Then the thing that they had left inside of her pussy, which had been pushing her slowly open for almost two days, not letting her relax, leaving her sore and cramping, faded away into nothingness, leaving her empty and open.

It seemed that it was time.

The warbeast came toward her. One step, then another, then another. Right up until it was near enough that she could have reached out and touched it. From that close, its fur looked shaggy, like an old carpet, and there was the faint smell of rotting flesh on its breath. If she. . .

Behind her, there was the noise like air passing over an empty bottle. The beast's head turned, suddenly, and it sprang past her, headed for the Lady Caier, who had broken and run. It was on her in four steps, knocking her down with the flat of its paw. She tried to rise, and it knocked her across, five, ten feet away, and when she tried to rise again, it pounced on her, pinning her to the dirt of the parade ground with one flat, broad paw. She struggled weakly, and Beryllan could see something jutting out between the warbeast's thighs, bright red, impossibly long and broad. She backed away, and heard the creak. . . the gate it had come in through was closing.

If she'd thought more clearly, she would've hidden near that gate when it opened, and tried to escape then. Now, it was nearly shut. She ran toward it, the arm extensions flailing wildly as she ran. They'd throw her back, if she got through, but maybe--

The gates slammed shut as she reached them. She pounded on them, less angry and more desperate than Lady Caier had seemed, but just as inarticulate. She'd do what they wanted if they'd just. . . Beryllan was crying as she pounded on the gate, and it wasn't moving, and. . . 

There was a hot, foul breath on her back. Beryllan turned, slowly, and the warbeast seemed to grin at her. Then it tapped her with its paw, sending her sprawling on the ground.

Before she could rise, or even turn over, it was pressing down on her. Not with its whole weight; that would crush her. But with enough of it that she couldn't stand, that she could barely breathe, close enough that she could feel the vast and distant beat of its heart through her skin. And then the spells on her belly seemed to burst into flame. It hurt, and she cried, and she was aroused, and she was crying through that. Tinglingly aroused, her skin alive everywhere, awake to the rough texture of its outer fur, to the softness of the fur beneath it, to the hot, wet weight of the thing that was pushing between her legs, wider than her legs were.

There wasn't any way that was going to fit inside of her. It didn't matter how much work that the rebel wizards had done to her. She was going to die there, split in half, and Edrah was going to make a sarcastic lecture to her students about her, and. . . all other thoughts vanished as the warbeast's cock pushed up into her.

Beryllan's back was pressed down on the rocks and dirt of the parade ground, and her chest was flush against the monster's stomach. She could feel the pressure against her back and stomach as the monster's cock filled her. It was too big, and it was far too long, and she could feel it tearing her as it pushed in, sharp pains from her pussy, deeper hurts deeper inside. It filled her so completely that it forced the air from her lungs, and she gasped out into the fur of its belly.

But there was pleasure as well, almost as intense as the pain, almost worse than the pain. She moaned, and hated herself for it, her toes curling, her hands trembling, reaching up for the monster, despite the extensions they had strapped to them. She didn't want it, and she wouldn't have, but the magic was insistent, and building.

This was going to kill her. If they hadn't done what they'd done, it already would've killed her. And it hurt so very much. The pleasure was there, and it was as intense as the pain, but it didn't drown it or replace it; it was both those things at once. But she didn't have to do anything--she couldn't do anything. It had pinned her down everywhere with its bulk, and she didn't even have to breathe--when it pulled out, breath whooshed back into her lungs; when it thrust in again, it was expelled. All she had to do, and all she could do, was to lie there and endure, to howl in agony and ecstasy.

The monster's cock wasn't just so much bigger than a person's that there was barely any comparison. It was also harder, and the thing was using it with more energy; Beryllan was rattled by the force of it as the pace picked up, run through as though by a sword. Then the warbeast tensed and shuddered, and she could feel the flood of semen filling her up. It was like a hose had been turned on, like that thing which they'd used to feed the lady Caier. Not just one pulse or five, but a dozen, more, and each time, even though she had been grossly distended by the size of the thing inside of her, by its weight, she could feel the flood of liquid inside of her.

Edrah had told her students not to let the subjects climax. But as the semen filled her, her legs trembled uncontrollably, and she could feel the pressure build inside her, and break like a wave. She was gasping, writhing, as the heat and pleasure spread through her; she was still coming when the warbeast pulled out of her, stood up, and walked away, the tip of its cock rubbing along the length of her body as it trotted past her.

When it was done, Beryllan's belly was swollen with how much it had come in her; it was draining from between her legs in a flood, to mingle with the blood and juices that had flowed from her when it had fucked her. Beryllan lay there and looked up at the clouds. Then she heard empty-jug hoots beyond her, and turned to see the monster thrusting into the Lady Caier a second time.

It had finished with her, but it was not yet finished with her. It mounted her two more times, once as she lay looking up the clouds, and the second time after she had turned over and was trying to crawl to one of the doors. That wasn't something that she had decided to do, exactly, it was just that her body hurt too much for her not to do something. It hurt more that last time, because she was on her belly, and because it was tearing other parts of her. Each time it did, Beryllan orgasmed. And orgasmed hard, every muscle in her body tensed, the pleasure so strong it hurt, and the fact that the warbeast had pleasured her so totally hurting more than all the pain.

After the second time, Beryllan was still awake, but she was barely conscious; she didn't notice it when the handlers led the warbeast away, and didn't move at all when the guards tried to whip her into standing. So they lifted her, holding her under her arms, to strap her to the hurdles that they used to hold the subjects in place while the scholars worked.

She was aware enough to recognize Edrah, to see the smug satisfaction in her expression, as she felt the bulge in Beryllan's stomach.

"Good," she said. "The cervix remains strong enough to hold a measure of the semen in. At a minimum, we've given the warbeast a pleasant day out." She rumpled Lady Caier's hair. "And I think our subjects have enjoyed themselves as well, by the evidence. That was quite some enthusiasm, 505--several of the guards greatly enjoyed your performance. And once we've confirmed that conception has occurred, I'm sure they'll stop by to demonstrate their gratitude."

Lady Caier's nose had been broken at some point during the proceedings, and one of the students had just begun setting it. She looked up at Edrah with a face covered in dust, dried blood going from her nose to her chin. And Beryllan could see the shame and the pain and the defeat there. She had fought, and she had kept fighting, and she had lost. Edrah seemed delighted by that, tracing a line along Lady Caier's ribs to her hips, which wriggled at the touch, the magic active despite everything. Or maybe it wasn't that; maybe she'd given up so completely that she was willing to take pleasure where she could, regardless of everything else. 

"We'll wait until the pregnancies are confirmed before we begin spreading them again, though I'm not certain how much good that will do. Make sure that the damage to the spell signs is repaired or mitigated, and make sure that you set the magic well enough that it won't be distorted as their bodies spread out. Priority is aiding with the conception, of course--I think that holding the cervix closed for at least another hour or two will be the first step in that process, but I will leave that to your judgment."

It seemed that in their judgment, it was a good idea. And it was also a good idea to make Beryllan and the Lady Caier walk four-legged around the parade ground, despite their wounds and exhaustion, and when even whipping couldn't get them to walk any further, to force a half dozen orgasms on them. That was almost worse than the warbeasts had been. One of the students sat beside Beryllan where she was sprawled out on the parade ground, rubbing his thumb lightly across her clit, as the other strengthened the runes carved into her flesh. The orgasms were brilliantly intense, leaving her short of breath, with spots swirling behind her eyes each time; after the first two, Arebellan found herself suckling hungrily on the student's thumb. He had a broad, half-foreign face, with pock marks on his cheeks, and he grinned down at her when she did that.

Beryllan closed her eyes. She hated herself for what she was doing, who she was doing it with, but she didn't stop moving beneath his hands, didn't release his thumb from her lips. It was the arousal spell, and it was only that. She tried to hold onto that thought as the next orgasm built, but lost track of it, lost track of all thought at all. Sooner or later, they were done. Sooner or later, they let her release the load of the warbeast's come that was still inside of her; it ran down her legs as she ate from her trough, thick and sticky and so much of it that there was still a puddle there when they led them back to their cages to sleep.

The Lady Caier was asleep as soon as they locked the door, snoring slightly. Beryllan took longer to fall asleep. Her hands were still strapped into those crutches, so she couldn't touch herself, couldn't feel the scars and marks of the wounds that the students had healed, couldn't try to purge the last of those aphrodisiac spells by her own efforts--she would have to hope that they gave her relief, otherwise she would not get it.

The next morning, Beryllan could already feel a weight in her belly, a roundness that hung below her as she trotted across the parade grounds. Which was ridiculous; it had just been a day. But Edrah noticed it as well, pointed it out to the students who were with her. "As you can see, while they might have been possible, accelerants weren't necessary. Whoever it was that the Lord Preceptor of Rainshorn had pressed into service to make his warbeast had taken that into account, and focused on making something that would reproduce rapidly, and grow just as fast. Of course, they haven't decided to attempt hybridizing their creations, so the females are designed to bear the load somewhat more gracefully than ours. We shall have to begin the force-feeding this afternoon, and the paste is going to have to be highly caloric."

"Nutrition is--" started one of the students.

"Going to be calibrated according to the needs of the fetus, of course," said Edrah. "The hosts will have to survive the process, if possible, but this fetus is going to be a template for duplication spells. I want a perfect hybrid, first time out, so that we can turn our resources to other projects."

"They're going to have to stay moving," said one of them. "Or it's going to shift--the spells we're using to keep the liver from being crushed are--"

"Yes, of course," said Edrah. "We'll have them running the circuit constantly. When you need to work on them, stop them where they stand, or bring them back to the restraints. Oh, and since the pregnancies are confirmed, they are available for leisure, though not during working hours, of course."

Running the circuit, as it turned out, meant hobbling along the route at the edge of the wall as best they could, using those crutches they had to wear full time. It wasn't that bad at the start, but it got bad pretty quickly. Rather than pacing along behind them, the guards sat themselves along at intervals, and would get up and beat them if they strayed off the path, or if they stopped for long.

Near the main gates, Edrah and Radell set up a drinking trough and a food trough, and they were allowed to stop for a drink and for food there whenever they made a complete circuit.

Beryllan wasn't one of those enthusiasts who wasted their time and energy in chasing a shuttleball or any such thing; running was for people who didn't have the leisure to walk, or, better, take a hansom. And it seemed that Lady Caier had been of the same opinion. And they had both suffered a great deal the day before. So by the time they reached the feeding station, they lingered as long as they could, bending down to eat and drink from their troughs. And when they couldn't, they walked the length of the wall, and when they couldn't do that, they lay down in their traces, until they were beaten enough to drag themselves forward.

It was almost a relief when the students called them over and fitted them into the restraints. People's shoulders weren't meant for the sort of work that they were doing, and their legs weren't meant for constant grinding effort, either. Yes, it hurt, when the students removed some of the runes that had been written onto their bodies, and yes, it hurt worse when they replaced those marks with others. But at least they were still when those marks were being cut.

Only the breaks weren't frequent enough, and it seemed that they weren't eating enough. When the guards took their breaks for lunch, Radall strapped Beryllan and the Lady Caier to their stands, and then forced the nozzle of the feeding device into Beryllan's mouth, then deeper, massaging the tube into her throat through her neck. Beryllan was sure that she would vomit, but she couldn't; on one of the breaks she had taken to allow the students to work, they had put a ring of burning stone runes around her neck, which kept her gorge down. Then he emptied what was left in her trough into the hopper, and one of the students who had remained turned the crank, as Radell got on with the Lady Caier, who opened her mouth for the feeding tube and waited with her eyes closed as the food began pouring into her stomach.

It hurt. It hurt a lot; Beryllan couldn't retch and couldn't vomit, but she was swelling beyond her capacity to swell, the bulge in her belly met with another larger, heavier bulge. It cramped, and she couldn't--she couldn't even belch, the food was coming in so thickly. She strained against her bonds, hands shaking where they were strapped to her crutches, but it didn't matter. The crank kept turning and the paste kept filling her.

"So," said someone behind her. A woman. "Are you really going to?"

"Sure," said a male voice. The pock-marked man, whose finger Beryllan had sucked. "No question about the pregnancy, so there's no chance of ruining anything. And she's not even that distorted yet. I mean, in the last days, that'd be like fucking a fat-blind pig, but--"

 

"But she's going to be looser than your mom," said the woman.

"Oh," said the man. "I'm not going to be fucking her there. We're going to have to start loosening that up more tomorrow, and I don't want. . . but her ass still looks round and nobly pale, and I'm not going have to buy her a bottle of wine first."

The woman laughed, and there was the cool of oil being spilled on Beryllan's ass. The hopper was barely half-empty by that point; there wasn't any way it would be finished before he was done with her. The student turning the crank gave a look over Beryllan's shoulder and shrugged. Then the man pushed a finger into Beryllan's ass, and she jumped in her bonds, trying to escape. But she couldn't get away from the thing down her throat, and she couldn't get away from the thing pushing into her ass, and it wasn't long before he pulled the finger out, and pushed his cock in.

It was too long and too broad, but compared to what had happened the day before, it was scarcely anything at all. Beryllan breathed through her nose and endured as the man made satisfied noises, as the woman laughed, and they filled her stomach with the paste that she'd been eating all day.

"So why her, and not the red-head?" asked the woman. "Red-head is prettier."

"Ass isn't as cushioned," said the pock-marked man. "Not really looking at her face right now, anyway. And also. . . had a cousin who worked for the Maymercies. Give him a story that he'd like."

The woman laughed, and then patted Beryllan's head. "There you go, 504. While your circumstances might have changed a bit, you're still providing conversation for gossip mongers. A little downmarket from the society pages, but still--you do what you can."

"You might light up the aphrodisiac spells?" asked the man. "Those are okay--Edrah was going on about the connection between arousal and smooth delivery--and I want her moaning."

"Sure," said the woman, and then Beryllan was turned on. As turned on as she'd been when the warbeast had fucked her, just like that. It wasn't her who groaned and wriggled as the man thrust into her, it wasn't her who burned at the touch of his hand on her hip. It was the runes, it was the magic that they were working on her. And it wasn't her who was pleased with herself when the man came, his grasp tightening on her hip, hard enough to make her cry out, and it was her who wished he would've stayed a little longer, him and his girlfriend, even if they were just talking to each other, not to her, even if he wanted to fuck her again.

She was a little lonely when they left, though, and it was just the nozzle of the force-feeder.

The next day, the bulges in their stomachs were more noticeable. Bulges in their stomachs, and swelling at wrists and ankles. Edrah was pleased with that--it seemed they'd gotten a sufficient number of calories into the subjects, at least for the first days, and the pregnancies were proceeding apace. Neither Beryllan or the Lady Caier proceeded apace, though, as they ran the circuit--there were fewer breaks, because the students had finished most of the work the day before, and they were in worse shape, and the day was hotter. Beryllan plodded grimly along as best she could, but the Lady Caier would shudder and rush ahead whenever one of the guards raised a whip, until she couldn't anymore, and collapsed by the side of the wall.

The guard who was sitting there watching came up and hit her, five, eight times, hitting the back of her thighs and the soles of her feet. The Lady Caier just lay there and wept. The guard shook his head and then unzipped the fly of his pants. Beryllan plodded on past them, her eyes on the troughs of food and water, trying not to hear Lady Caier's hooting moans, or the wet sounds of what the guard was doing to her. But it seemed that was enough to get Lady Caier to her feet when he was done. She joined Beryllan at the troughs, tears drying on her face, the guard's come drying on her thighs.

The muck in the food trough was awful. But so was the forced feeder. And despite having had her stomach pumped full of muck the evening before, and despite how awful the stuff in the trough was, Beryllan was ravenous. She ate and ate, until a flick the guard's whip told her that she had to walk another circuit. And when she was done with that, she ate more. By the times the guards had their lunch break and let Beryllan and Lady Caier lay down, Beryllan's stomach was noticeably rounder than it had been that morning, and taut. It had been clear what they had intended to do, and it was clear when they were doing it, but at the same time, Beryllan hadn't entirely believed, not really, not until she was lying in the shade of the wall, looking at herself, at the changes in her stomach, where it was rounder, and she could see her veins through her skin, and the increased heaviness in her breasts. It was real, and it was really happening to her.

Edrah noticed those changes as well, and as Beryllan and Lady Caier had their break, she laid out the assignments for the afternoon. They had to make sure that the skin stretched rather than tore, which would require magical assistance, given how rapidly the pregnancy was going to proceed. Similarly, it was time to begin preparing the subjects for the trauma of the delivery.

"The issue," said Edrah, "is two-fold. The first and most pressing problem is going to be getting the fetus through the lesser pelvis of the subjects. It is true that we could attempt surgical removal, but a natural birth of the hybrid is both more propitious according to all the auguries that we've cast, and an excellent technical challenge. With that said, I would also like for both subjects to survive the delivery, if possible, and in a state where they can be used again for similar work.

"Which is more important?" asked one of the students. "Live birth, or live subjects?"

Edrah had taken a seat between Beryllan and Lady Caier where the guards had chained them to hurdles, and she was playing with Lady Caier's breasts as she talked, making her squeak and moan. She got one of Lady Caier's stiff, pale pink nipples between her fingers, as she considered the question. "I have a very strong preference for the live birth," she said. "If it proves absolutely impossible for this to be achieved while preserving the lives of our subjects, then we may have to consider surgical intervention. But only if that is the only other option. Otherwise, I want the births to be vaginal, and I want the subjects alive and conscious throughout."

"So the pelvic girdle--"

"The pelvic girdle is a challenge," said Edrah. She weighed Lady Caier's breast in her hand, and seemed satisfied with what she'd found. "The vaginal canal will also have to be similarly enlarged, through methods magical and otherwise. Some tearing is inevitable, but I do not want excessive arterial spray; that will make things difficult, both in terms of controlling the hybrids' diet, and in terms of keeping the subjects alive."

She looked over at Beryllan, who looked solidly into the middle distance. Not away from her, and not at her.

"Good," said Edrah. "I expect that we shall be seeing even more dramatic changes in our subjects in the days to come. And while these patriots return to their pacing, let us consider the problems that we are facing, and the methods through which we shall solve them. Another tweak at Lady Caier's nipple, and then she extended her hand to the Lady Caier, who gave it a shy lick. Probably it had to do with the magic that had been done to her, and not much other than that.

The students worked through the afternoon on the problem without needing either Beryllan or Lady Caier. So by the time they were strapped into the force-feeders, Beryllan's arms and legs and hips were trembling with exhaustion. It was almost a relief to have the feeding tube forced down her throat, because at least she wasn't trying to pace with those stupid arm extenders and swollen ankles, and a belly that had started to hang down below her, swaying with every step. It hurt, and she would've thrown it up if she could. She wasn't really hoping that the pock-marked man would come back, or that someone else would come, and talk about normal things where she could hear them. That was just daydreaming, and the leftover aphrodisiac spells.

Besides, they weren't done with her yet. They started the work even before she was unhooked from the feeding machine. It seemed that a magical effect couldn't be maintained for as long as they wanted, so they were resorting to the physical. A series of increasingly large glass plugs, shaped to completely fill their vaginal canals, and a bit more than that, and a bit more than that, held in place with a series of straps, which would allow full anal access. Also, it seemed that retaining urine in their bladders was counter-indicated, and so there would be catheters inserted and threaded through the base of the plugs, so they would be constantly dripping.

Compared to everything else that had been done to them, Beryllan shouldn't have cared that much about the indignity. It was one last thing which she had kept, and now that was taken away from her as well.

Once the plugs were shaped, and inserted, and magically expanded to the point where Beryllan was sure that she was going to rupture, they turned on the aphrodisiac spells, and a series of the male students used her, one after the other.

It seemed that the pock-marked man had enjoyed Beryllan's company--Lady Caier had her visitors as well, but fewer of them. And, it seemed by what they said to each other, and by how quickly they emptied themselves into her ass, that the plug filling her left her anus pleasantly taut. It wasn't something that she had previously considered one of her great assets, but the were there, and they were human, and they were warm against the night. Or at least, that's what the aphrodisiac spells made her think. The woman who had been there the night before decided to join them, before the second to last of the men finished, and she pulled her up her skirts in front of Beryllan's face, and told her to lick.

She did. The aphrodisiacs had left her impossibly eager, and it seemed that while the climaxes that she had enjoyed with the warbeast had aided the conception, the students had been given strict instructions to keep her from enjoying a similar climax until the delivery, so there wasn't going to be any relief for her. The best she could hope for was the satisfaction of others, the way their hands on her would suddenly relax, the occasional pat or soft touch after they were done. Beryllan closed her eyes, licked the way that the woman told her, not entirely enjoying the taste, not at all enjoying how turned on she was, how much she hoped to be touched when the woman had finished, how disappointed she was when they left her in the cages for the night.

The next day, and the day after that, and the day after that, all proceeded in more or less the same way. Their stomachs grew and changed, heavier and rounder, swinging so low beneath them that the insistence on the arm extenders started to make sense; they were growing too heavy to carry themselves on their feet, but leaning forward, with their shoulders taking some of the load, they could still manage it. They had to manage it, or the guards would force them on, with cruel little tricks--they'd jab sharp things at their feet and their inner thighs, they'd thread string up their noses and out their mouths and they'd pull them along with that, and so on. It was easier to plod along as best they could, constantly hungry, aching in their joints and their stomachs and their breasts and their thighs, trying not to think.

The aphrodisiac spells helped with that. They were being used more heavily, to make sure that the vaginal canals would spread open further, and be held open further--it seemed that they were going to open the pelvic girdle, magically, for the delivery, and attempt to close it up afterward. But they were going to see how wide they could stretch the vaginal canal with mundane methods before they resorted to magic. One of Edrah's little cruelties, of which she seemed to have as great a store as she did of chatter.

The fetuses had started to move on the third day, and the one in Beryllan didn't seem to stop much after that. Twisting, turning, pushing, constantly moving, in slow, dreamlike waves. They had to add runes to make sure that it didn't move too much, didn't tear through her when it kicked, though Edrah fussed about that.

Edrah would meet with her students and review while the guards took their lunch breaks, and she had taken to playing with Beryllan's clit while she did so, idly. They'd scribed a burning stone rune on Beryllan's clitoral hood, to make sure that she couldn't come, but it didn't kill other sensation at all. So she would be bought to the brink, and pushed further, without being able to actually cross over the edge. As they considered whether it would be a better idea to crack her pelvis mechanically or magically, Beryllan fought back grunts and moans, tried not to let herself move against Edrah's hand, even though it was soft and warm, even though the aphrodisiac spells were driving her to it, the same way a drunk was driven to the bottle.

The breaks were almost as bad as running the circuit; at least when she ran the circuit, she could eat, she could drink, and she wasn't kept in the same place long enough to leave a puddle. And when it was over, at night, there were fewer and fewer men who stopped by to use her. Edrah made it clear that if any of them made any complaints, they were going to remove Beryllan's teeth, and wire her jaws open--given what they'd done to Lady Caier's vocal cords, she had no doubt that it was true. And that was why she sucked on cocks when they were offered, why she moaned around them, why she swallowed every drop that they gave her. Because of the threats, and the spells, and because it was getting dark early, and this was all she had.

As the days progressed, Beryllan's belly got bigger and bigger. They increased the length of the extenders, and added short stilts to their legs, so that they could continue to walk the circuit. It was more and more difficult to stand while they fed at the troughs; Lady Caier was the first to just shove her face in, and drink down the slurry they were given, but it didn't take too long before Beryllan copied her. Their stomachs weighed more than the rest of them did, by that point. As Edrah explained to her students, the subjects were support systems for the fetuses; it wasn't so much that the warbeast hybrids were growing inside of them, as they had become chrysalises for the hybrids, a shell from which they would emerge.

One day, as they awkwardly plodded around the circuit, they were allowed to stop, brought beneath a pavilion, and cleaned. Beryllan had gotten used to the catheters--how they hurt, each morning, going in, the smell of it, the constant stream down the inside of her leg. They put a bucket under her, and scrubbed her back and her sides, and the vastness of her belly, and her impossibly sensitive breasts, which had grown and grown as her stomach had swelled. Then Edrah made sure they were restrained with collars and chains, even though they could barely waddle around the edge of the wall, and that only under duress. Then they put some signs up in front of them, and other things were brought out; cannon, and farcasters and other military tools, and then the populace of Bresca came to review what the revolutionary government had achieved in terms of building an army.

Some of the men--men who bore scars here and there, and a few of the younger men, whose hair had already been given the military crop, were more interested in the cannons and other such impedimenta of war. Most of the other visitors, though, were more interested in the Lady Seffa Caier, and the Lady Beryllan Maymercy. There had been a Caier owned match factory in Bresca, and there were hideously deformed women who suffered from something called "fossy jaw," which they blamed on their work in the factory. They were delighted by Lady Caier's state, and would throw rocks and clods of dirt at her to make her hoot and cower, until the guards had to show them off. There was less of a personal interest in the Lady Maymercy, but there was some. People who'd worked on her father's northern estates, for the most part, who were quite happy with what had been done to the woman who had been educated at the best schools thanks to the sweat of their brows.

It was not a particularly sensible attitude to take. Would they have been better served if her father had spent his money on horses or drink? Or, perhaps they would have preferred it if he had turned the estates over to the wool breeders, and sent the workers out to beg in the streets. But it was not an invitation to a debate, and if she had been invited, Beryllan would not have chosen to attend. What earthly difference did those men think their opinion had to her?

When the guards wheeled out the feeding troughs, Beryllan had to admit that there was some difference. She dipped her mouth in, tried to eat as daintily as she could manage. Unlike the lady Caier, who dove in with full abandon, to the laughter of those watching. Then there was a demonstration of the force-feeding procedure, and there wasn't any dignity in that. There were laughs and cheers and feigned disgust, just as there was every time the fetus turned inside of her, which was visible from far enough away that the visitors could see its arms and legs and head.

Neither was there any when they removed the glass plug from her cunt. They had worked her up to something as large as a human baby, more or less, and there were a range of comments, as it was taken out, and displayed, and then re-inserted. Not one of the remarks that Beryllan heard had much sympathy for her. She was the Lady Maymercy, and in addition to a precis of what the military was doing to her, they had a list of the crimes of which she had been convicted. That was sufficient to justify everything that was being done to her, and more. There was a fence that kept the crowds three paces back from the exhibits. If that fence had not been there, she would have been covered in sputum, rather than just occasionally sprayed with it.

Sympathy, such as it was, had to wait for that evening. As the hybrid had made them more and more grossly distended, fewer and fewer of the students or guards stopped by to fuck them after they no longer had to run the circuit. But that night, after the parade grounds were once again emptied, and Beryllan and Lady Caier had been force-fed their evening nutriment, the pock-marked man and his girl came by again. He stood in front of her, not opening his trousers; he put his hand under her chin, gave her a thumb to suck on. Beryllan did, gratefully. There had been a constant pressure from the aphrodisiac spells, from Edrah's teasing, from the mass in her cunt. She would take anything even close to release, whoever was giving it.

The pock-marked man shook his head. "She's a good girl, really," he said. "Does as she's told, doesn't cause trouble. She's not broken, like the other one, but she's no trouble."

"She'd be trouble if she had a chance to make it," said the girl. She patted Beryllan's side. "Wouldn't you, 504? If you had your rights, you'd see us all impaled, right?"

She would. But rather than answering, Beryllan closed her eyes and sucked on the man's thumb, felt his hand on her cheek, under her chin. If she had her rights, she would kill him for having done this to her. If she had wings, she could fly. Neither of those options applied.

The man laughed. "Well, wouldn't you? She was just an idiot with a title. Probably didn't even know she had factories--just assumed the money came from somewhere."

"She's a university graduate," said the woman.

"True," said the man. "And sure, she could've figured out what it meant that she owned factories, thought about whether it was right or wrong. But . . . I mean, I don't know. I'm just not sure she deserves all this."

The woman shrugged. "So, what did she do to deserve being one of the fifty wealthiest people in the nation? Or the stables or the mansions or all that? Yeah, maybe she'd didn't deserve this. But it's not like she deserved anything else she had, either."

"Heh," said the guy. "Fair enough."

"Anyway. Did you want to fuck her?"

He considered. "It's a bit too much like fucking a cow at this point."

"Oh, come on," she said. "Close your eyes, and think about when she was young and slim and there were literally dozens of deaths a year that she could've prevented by treating her employees a little better. She licks better when she's being fucked."

"Fine," he said. "But this is the last time."

"Probably," said the woman. "That thing looks like it's going to hatch, and then we can start doing real work, cloning those bastards."

The man moved around behind her. There was oil on her ass, and his hands, and Beryllan couldn't help making a little noise somewhere between pleasure and pain as he pushed in, and another when the woman lifted up her skirt and let Beryllan lick. If she had her rights, they'd . . . but it felt good, and when she was done, the way she ruffled Beryllan's hair felt good. Almost like absolution.

It wasn't the next day. That went as usual; slowly grunting their way around the track as the guards shot them with slingshots, or beat them with sticks to keep them moving, and then a feeding, and then a lonely night crammed into cages which had become too small for them. But then, the next day, the contractions started.

It hurt so much that Beryllan would've passed out, if the magic hadn't prevented that. She fell off her crutches to lie in the dirt, howling. It took a little while for the guards to decide that she wasn't shamming--it took time, and kicks, and a lit match pressed against the small of her back. Then Lady Caier started feeling it as well, and Edrah decided that it was time to begin their procedures.

While the surgeons were called, Edrah allowed the students to use painkilling spells on Beryllan and Lady Caier. Just enough to get them back on their feet, get them moving around the course. Each contraction was like . . . it was like being beaten by a hammer, from the inside out. The thing was pushing against her trying to get out. And it would not fit.

After a while, the students took the plugs out of their cunts, and it was a strange, loose feeling, when compared to the pressure that was building up inside of her. And then Beryllan's water broke.

For an instant, she thought that she had given birth; that it was already done, just like that. There was so much of it, and she felt deflated, like a punctured balloon. But no; it was just water, a whole lake of it that she had to splash through as they led her over to where the surgeons waited.

It seemed that instead of breaking the pelvis, or distorting it with magic, they were going to use a transit spell to get the fetus through. Edrah was sulking a little bit about that--she had been looking forward to hearing the bones snap--but she had been convinced that it would both satisfy the auguries, and be the safest course for the hybrid. "And," as the girlfriend of the pock-marked man point out, "it's just for the pelvis, not for the whole vaginal canal."

It was. They cast the spell, and the pain chained from pressure to something much worse. It was like when the beast had raped her; it was something far too big pushing through somewhere far too small. It was tearing her in half, right down the middle. Beryllan screamed, a real scream that ripped up her throat and corded her neck, and pulled her fists into balls. She couldn't--she couldn't--

"Now," said Edrah. "The aphrodisiacs. And ease on the painkillers, please."

The pain doubled; Beryllan's head was thrashing back and forth, her body was convulsing. They held her in place, and Edrah knelt down beside her, forced a mass of cloth between Beryllan's teeth, and patted her cheek. "There," she said, to Beryllan's wide-eyed stare. Then she took a bit of burning stone, held it where Beryllan could see it, before bringing it down to her clit.

A howl through the cloth, as it obliterated the rune there, which had prevented her from coming. And another howl through the cloth, as the hybrid pushed a little bit further through Beryllan. Then Edrah flicked her clit, lightly, and Beryllan came. There was no pleasure in that orgasm, just pain, just muscles burning and spasming, just a release of a fraction of the endless pressure inside of her. A breath, and then Edrah flicked her clit again, to the same reaction; a twisting, burning orgasm, that hurt almost as much as the thing pushing its way out through her.

"That's it," said Edrah. "There you go. Push."

And again. Beryllan had been kept so aroused, for so long, that even if there was some way to resist the magic, she wasn't sure if she'd want to. It was. . . it was an agony, and it was a release, and each convulsion that she went through pushed the thing a little further along.

The magic kept her from passing out, and it seemed that Edrah was more interested in her than in the Lady Caier; Beryllan heard her empty-jar cries, heard the students and the surgeons working on her, but Edrah was watching her and only her, smiling at every groan and scream that managed to get through that lump of cloth.

It went on for hours, for centuries. Things ripped inside of her; there were streams of blood that the surgical specialists caught in mid air, channeled back into her veins. There was a pop and a rending sensation, which might have been her hips; Edrah enjoyed that a good deal, forced two orgasms onto Beryllan in quick succession immediately after.

Once, when she was a girl, Beryllan had been thrown from her horse when they were on the hunt. That was a thing that happened often enough when learning riding, and Beryllan had been old enough to understand her position; crying was well enough for girls of lesser breeding, but Maymercies didn't show pain. So she lay there on the grass looking up at the sky until the attendants could come and set her ankle. She'd been very hurt, but she hadn't cried, and her father had praised her for that.

The clouds overhead looked like the clouds had that day, like spiderwebs in the empty blue of the sky. She was crying and screaming and yelling and the only feelings she had below her waist were pain. Everything was different, but the clouds were the same.

And then, with a last rending tear, something came loose from inside of her, and staggered up to its feet. It was the size of a calf, maybe bigger. The same long, canine muzzle that the warbeast had, the same bat-cupped ears, and though it staggered, as it took its first steps, there was the same cat-quickness to the way it walked. But its fur was as blonde as Beryllan's hair, and it had piercing blue Maymercy eyes. There was a moment when they looked at each other, the warbeast and the lady Beryllan Maymercy. If she had her rights. . . Beryllan didn't know what she'd do, if she'd had her rights.

The students crowded around it. First, a soporific spell, and then they started cutting with scalpels, and working with the burning stones. It was not going to be free, it was never going to be free.

Beryllan looked away from the hybrid warbeast, which meant looking at Edrah.

"Well," said Edrah. "You're a bit of a mess."

She reached over, grabbed a roll of loose flesh from Beryllan's stomach, and shook it; Beryllan winced in pain. "Not sure if it makes more sense to leave these until you're filled again, or to have the trainees practice their cosmetic surgery until you're looking like yourself again, before we put something else in you."

Beryllan couldn't feel her legs. She couldn't feel them at all. She started to panic, and Edrah saw it.

"Very well," she said. "One more. A long one, so that you properly enjoy the moment."

She dipped her fingers in a puddle of Beryllan's blood, and started rubbing her clit. Beryllan moaned, and Edrah laughed. "You know," she said, as Beryllan started twisting, on the verge of orgasm, "there's talk that of discharging some of the property verdict convicts, once the treaty with Rainshorn is finalized. Rehabilitation."

Beryllan couldn't move her hips, not at all. There was something broken inside of her. But she still moved at Edrah's touch. "If it happens, I think I will recommend that the Lady Seffa Caier be given a chance to rejoin society. She's learned her lesson, and performed a valuable service for the nation. But as far as the Lady Beryllan Maymercy goes. . ." she stopped touching Beryllan, just when she was on the point of orgasm, watched her breathing, watched her trying to pull herself together. "Well, I believe that my service has been recognized as well. And if this particular piece of government property is to be deaccessioned, I expect that it will become my private property. You were a class above me in university, you know? So much to talk about. And perhaps if I am reduced to a smaller staff, I will be able to enlist your aid in various experiments.

Then she pushed Beryllan over the edge into an orgasm. And another one, and another, until she couldn't breathe, until the spots swirled behind her eyes, and she felt herself falling away. Then Edrah got up and walked away, and the students and the surgeons got to work on Beryllan.


End file.
